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Lily Grindrod, Life Practitioner at 11 St Mary’s (Adult Services South) recently spent time with the Speech and Language Therapy (SALT) team. Lily is considering a career in SALT.

Speech and Language Therapy are a specialist service within ²»Á¼Ñо¿Ëù’s Therapeutic Services team. In order to practice, SALTs need to have a recognised degree in Speech and Language Therapy and must be registered with the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC).

SALT provide a Universal, Targeted and Specialist service to the people that we support for communication and eating and drinking:

• Universal – Effective communication training for colleagues, universal effective communication visual resources, inclusive communication environment recommendations, communication profiles and DisDAT/pain profiles
• Targeted – service specific training e.g. dysphagia, sign language, group therapy, attending meetings
• Specialist – specific EHCP requirements (Education, Health and Care Plans), referrals for specific interventions/assessments, individual therapy focusing on specific communication goals, writing social stories for specific needs

As Lily found out, every day SALT life is different!

• Day 1 – Lily spent the day at An Caladh with Lou Brown, Speech and Language Therapist, building therapeutic relationships with the people we support and the An Caladh team using craft activities, sensory items and exploring emotional regulation tools. Lily and Lou created a visual schedule for a person that we support to aid their independence in ordering a coffee at the local Co-Op (who knew the process of ordering a latte involved 27 mini-steps?!)
• Day 2 – Lily spent the day with the Swinderby Speech and Language Therapy team – Abi Bublik, Hannah Palfreyman, Jackie Rowntree and Dawn Robertson – and got involved in a sensory story session with Falcons class, supporting a young person to use his electronic communication aid in class, and a food play session for one of our young people who has ARFID (Avoidant/Restrictive Food Intake Disorder – for more information, please visit the website).

Lily reflected on her ‘day in the life’ with “I would like to say a big thank you to the team for making me feel very welcome and I really enjoyed seeing the range of support being provided. It was very interesting to see the strategies and tools used and how important it is that everybody involved in a supported person’s care works together. At times it did feel like being a detective trying to unpick and figure out people’s communication needs and preferences, while also letting them lead the sessions I shadowed. It was a very fun experience and is definitely a career I am considering.”

For anyone else considering a career in Speech and Language Therapy, please get in touch with the SALT team or visit the website.